October 31, 2013 - Constantly Making Adjustments During Prep & Variables

Comparison Pictures - 2012 (Top) vs. 2013 (Bottom) - Top image was 151ish lbs.  Bottom image was 152ish lbs.  My next offseason, I will invest more time in a caloric surplus.  I spent 3-4 months of bulking between the 2 pictures and I probably have gained 1-2 lbs of LBM.  Life of a natty ;P

I woke up this morning at 151.6 lbs!  That’s almost a 2 lb. drop from last week!  I need to slow this train down as I’m losing weight too quickly, putting LBM retention and performance at risk.  I brought my calories down from 2300 to 2100 calories last week because I did not witness a goaled measurable weight loss from last week to prior week (goal is 0.5-1.0 lbs. of loss per week).  My training hasn’t changed and I have yet incorporate cardio into the mix.  I did have a great experience cleaning up my carbs from the tasty processed variety (cereal and ice cream) to potatoes.  I had great experience with potatoes last year during my prep.  I found spuds to be very easily digestible by my body.  Perhaps that’s why the weight loss slowdown occurred 2 weeks ago when I decided I had to make that change from 2300 to 2100 calories—I was intestinally backed up.  I’m bringing the dial back up to 2300 and continue eating potato wedges, baked potato, fries, and hash browns for my main source of carbs and see what happens.

Current macros on reg days +200 calories (+50g carbs):
230g P, 230g C, 50g F = 2300 calories

Current macros on refeed:
150g-230g P, 400g-480g C, 50gF = 3000 calories

So, Variables....

There are 2 main variables that I like to tinker with when dieting—cutting or gaining, and I like to play with one while keeping the other constant so it’s more controlled.  (1) Diet and (2) Training.

By keeping training constant—same intensity, same routine from week to week—you will burn roughly X amount of calories from week to week.  It changes little.  Your calorie burn is now fixed, then you can play with your diet and consume less calories to cut, or more calories to burn.  In contrast, you can do the opposite.  Eat the same amount of calories each day and do more work (burn more calories) to cut, or do less work (burn less calories) to gain.  I like to let my diet govern my goals for the most part.  My training changes little if any between offseason and contest prep.  The only thing that changes is my diet—eat more to grow, eat less to shred.  I consider cardio as supplemental as I do not do it during my offseason and I am not too big of a fan of it.  Cardio is a useful tool to increase caloric expenditure, but the drawback is that for any type of cardio, it runs the risk of catabolism.  It is just the nature of cardio exercises.  I put off cardio until the very end and only if I really need it.